Making the Stinging Nettles Preparation

some additional suggestions and hands on advice

Everyone should consider making the stinging nettle preparation this spring. Nettles are abundant and tender in the springtime and it is one of the only biodynamic preparations that does not require an animal-derived membrane as a sheath. In a way, unlike the various floral preparations, nettles has incorporated more of animal life into its entire being. Of all the preparations, stinging nettles require the least investment of time and makes some of the very best compost — so there’s no excuse not to make at least a little of it. While nettles is often associated with Michaelmas — the time when bramble leaves turn a burnt red, by legend from Lucifer being cast out of heaven — we should remember that there is a polar relationship between spring and autumn, between dawn and sunset between earth and sky. What emerges in springtime is what entered in autumn. There are few more penitential herbs to harvest during April, the “cruelest month.”¹ Look around: in April everything is beautiful an…